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Prototype demonstration of transgenic resistance to the nematode Radopholus similis conferred on banana by a cystatin.

Cavendish banana was transformed using Agrobacterium tumefaciens to express a protein engineered rice cystatin (OcIdeltaD86) of value for control of plant parasitic nematodes. Expression for each line was under control of a constitutive promoter from the maize ubiquitin gene (UBI-1), a constitutive, chimeric promoter from the octopine and mannopine synthase genes of A. tumefaciens or a promoter from a root-preferentially expressed tubulin gene Arabidopsis (TUB-1). Lines were selected as of potential interest after 8 weeks challenge in containment if their mean R. similis/25 g roots for three sibling plants were more than 1 standard normal variate below the grand mean for all plants in c7-15 lines challenged concurrently. A total of 16 lines were selected on this basis as putative positives. Western blots confirmed that eight of these lines expressed cystatin with a mean of 0.08 +/- 0.04% tsp. All but two of 19 negatively selected lines from bioassays did not express cystatin. The mean resistance level of the confirmed positive lines was 69 +/- 17%. ELISA established the positive lines under control of UBI provided significantly higher expression levels of OcIdeltaD86 than recorded for the other two promoters. Lines of interest were confirmed as producing a transcript for OcIdeltaD86 by RT-PCR. Eight plants of one UBI promoter line expressing only 0.1 +/- 0.004% tsp as cystatin were re-challenged with R. similis and achieved a resistance of 70 +/- 10%. Subsequent repeat western blotting confirmed that this line still produced the cystatin after the trial. This is the first report of transgenic resistance against a major pest or disease of banana.

Animals↗

Horsefeathers: a commentary on "evolutionary versus prototype analyses of the concept of disorder".

J. C. Wakefield's (1999) article further develops his harmful dysfunction (HD) model for disorder concepts. This commentary focuses on three areas. The first notes the imbalance in the debate between the Lilienfeld and Marino (1995) Roschian model and the HD model for disorder concepts. The second claims that Wakefield's purposes for the HD model have changed over the years and progressed toward irrelevance to psychopathology in general and toward irrelevance to actual nosologic, reimbursement, and sociopolitical controversies about disorder status. Further discussion is on how certain structural elements in Wakefield's arguments and current limitations of evolutionary theory permit a superficially attractive model for psychopathology. These arguments and limitations, however, harbor serious problems when confronted with actual disputes about disorders. The conclusion notes some virtues to Wakefield's inquiry, in style and substance.

Biological Evolution↗

On prototypes and phonetic categories: a critical assessment of the perceptual magnet effect in speech perception.

According to P. K. Kuhl (1991), a perceptual magnet effect occurs when discrimination accuracy is lower among better instances of a phonetic category than among poorer instances. Three experiments examined the perceptual magnet effect for the vowel /i/. In Experiment 1, participants rated some examples of /i/ as better instances of the category than others. In Experiment 2, no perceptual magnet effect was observed with materials based on Kuhl's tokens of /i/ or with items normed for each participant. In Experiment 3, participants labeled the vowels developed from Kuhl's test set. Many of the vowels in the nonprototype /i/ condition were not categorized as /i/s. This finding suggests that the comparisons obtained in Kuhl's original study spanned different phonetic categories.

Analysis of Variance↗

Inhibitory effects of drinker and nondrinker prototypes on adolescent alcohol consumption.

This prospective study examined the relation between 308 adolescents' images of typical dinkers and nondrinkers and their subsequent alcohol consumption. The results indicate that both images are associated with changes in consumption between ages 16 and 18 but that they operate in different ways. Contrary to previous assumptions, drinker images do not represent goal states for adolescents in that they are more negative than their self-images and nondrinker images and are not correlated with their ideal selves. In contrast, nondrinker images do appear to represent goal states for adolescents who abstain from drinking. Implications for intervention are discussed.

Adolescent↗

Protection of cottontop tamarins against Epstein-Barr virus-induced malignant lymphoma by a prototype subunit vaccine.

Epstein-Barr (EB) virus is one of the five herpesviruses of man. Strong links between this agent and the chain of events causing two human cancers, endemic Burkitt's lymphoma and undifferentiated nasopharyngeal carcinoma, have long been evident (reviewed in ref. 1). Because of this, and because of the very high incidence of nasopharyngeal carcinoma in certain large populations, it was suggested in 1976 that a vaccine should be developed against EB virus to prevent infection and thereby reduce tumour incidence amongst those at risk. The virus-determined membrane antigen (MA) was proposed as immunogen because it was known to elicit naturally occurring virus-neutralizing antibodies in man and because analogous antigens had been shown to act as effective experimental vaccines for preventing the herpesvirus-induced lymphomas of Marek's disease in chickens. Progress has been achieved in defining, quantifying and preparing MA molecules, and in enhancing their immunogenicity; a sensitive assay for antibodies to MA has been elaborated. Here we report that isolated cell membranes expressing MA, or purified MA glycoprotein of relative molecular mass (Mr) 340,000 (gp340), have been used to vaccinate cottontop tamarins (Saguinus oedipus oedipus), and that animals receiving either preparation were protected against the effects of a 100% tumour-inducing challenge dose of EB virus.

Animals↗

Prototype systems for rechargeable magnesium batteries.

The thermodynamic properties of magnesium make it a natural choice for use as an anode material in rechargeable batteries, because it may provide a considerably higher energy density than the commonly used lead-acid and nickel-cadmium systems. Moreover, in contrast to lead and cadmium, magnesium is inexpensive, environmentally friendly and safe to handle. But the development of Mg batteries has been hindered by two problems. First, owing to the chemical activity of Mg, only solutions that neither donate nor accept protons are suitable as electrolytes; but most of these solutions allow the growth of passivating surface films, which inhibit any electrochemical reaction. Second, the choice of cathode materials has been limited by the difficulty of intercalating Mg ions in many hosts. Following previous studies of the electrochemistry of Mg electrodes in various non-aqueous solutions, and of a variety of intercalation electrodes, we have now developed rechargeable Mg battery systems that show promise for applications. The systems comprise electrolyte solutions based on Mg organohaloaluminate salts, and Mg(x)Mo3S4 cathodes, into which Mg ions can be intercalated reversibly, and with relatively fast kinetics. We expect that further improvements in the energy density will make these batteries a viable alternative to existing systems.

Journal Article↗

Prototype-referenced shape encoding revealed by high-level aftereffects.

We used high-level configural aftereffects induced by adaptation to realistic faces to investigate visual representations underlying complex pattern perception. We found that exposure to an individual face for a few seconds generated a significant and precise bias in the subsequent perception of face identity. In the context of a computationally derived 'face space,' adaptation specifically shifted perception along a trajectory passing through the adapting and average faces, selectively facilitating recognition of a test face lying on this trajectory and impairing recognition of other faces. The results suggest that the encoding of faces and other complex patterns draws upon contrastive neural mechanisms that reference the central tendency of the stimulus category.

Adaptation, Physiological↗